The body beautiful

BY Lesley Thomas |
27 February 2008

Your guide to make-up and more by Lesley Thomas. This week: the real mum's survival guide

Who'd be a mother in the 21st century? From the moment you see the blue line on the pregnancy test, you are under orders from childcare experts, midwives, the Government and busybodies in the supermarket checkout queue. And what you will learn is that everything you do is wrong.

Endless surveys and reports tell us that stay-at-home mothers are depressed, isolated and angry - but that if we leave the kitchen to earn a bean or two, our children will become sociopaths.

And yet, the dark circles, the stretch marks, the mum-tum, the withered cleavage, the depressing bank statements and the never-ending stress are not nearly enough to make us regret becoming mothers. However harassed a mother feels, a soft, fat little hand stroking her face every now and again is enough to make everything OK. Well, almost enough. I also have a battery of bottles and tubes that are helping me smile through the early years of parenthood.

If Holland & Barrett has its very own Pete Doherty, it is me. I couldn't, for example, get through this chapter of my life without Bach Rescue Remedy (£4.95;
hollandandbarrett.com
). Valerian Root Liquid Extract (£4.49) dropped into my camomile tea of an evening, combined with a shake of Neal's Yard Organic Lavender Oil (£8.50;
nealsyardremedies.com
) around the pillow, can improve the quality of a night's sleep, even if nothing can be done about the quantity.

Concealing a lack of sleep has been made very easy for me recently thanks to a late adoption of those twisty-clicky eye-brush pens. My favourites now are Clarins's Instant Light Perfecting Touch (£21.50; 0800 0363558) and Dior's Skinflash Radiance Booster Pen (£21; 020 7216 0216), which paint the grey away.

My war-torn tummy gets attention from Bliss's Love Handler gel (£28;
blisslondon.co.uk
), which releases caffeine - a tried and tested fat-fighting ingredient - throughout the day. It's not as effective as a trip to the gym, but at least I am doing something to whittle away my middle.

If you are feeling flash, Rodial's Tummy Tuck gel (£100;
rodial.co.uk
) is in demand among perfection-seeking yummy mummies for its collagen-boosting, skin-tightening ingredients. And, for a two-pronged belly attack, I use a little Korres Almond & Avocado Stretch Mark Cream (£15; 020 7581 6455), which heals and fades.

I hate to bring up the C-word, but a few handfuls of dimply fat are given free with each pregnancy and can be yours for ever. My search for the ultimate body smoother is as perpetual as my quest for the perfect black trousers, but Celluli-pro Slimming Complex cream from Sisley (£86; 020 7591 6380) is one to which I entrust my upper thighs, with noticeable but not miraculous results - which is all you can hope for from a tube.

When I can stand to look like a Spice Girl circa 1996, those clumpy MBT trainers really do help to tone the legs (from £135;
swissmasai.co.uk
). FitFlops are a cooler version, but it's a bit cold for them right now (£36;
thefitflop.com
).

It's rare that there is ever enough time for the kind of pampering I fantasise about - 90-minute treatments involving rose petals, softly spoken therapists and a guarantee of looking shinier and being happier at the end. The nearest I get these days to swimming in Lake Me is in the bath. In my BC (before children) years, a bath was a daily essential.

Now it is a snatched indulgence that involves forcibly ejecting a couple of 3ft interlopers and their plastic dollies. I break out the Knackered Cow Relaxing Bath Salts (£30;
cowshedonline.com
). As the eucalyptus and lavender work their magic on my back - which is aching from lugging green stuff that no one wants to eat back from Tesco - I fantasise that I am at Soho House (Manhattan branch), one of the hotels for which these salts have been created, and pretend I am soaking away a hard day's BC shoe shopping.

Some vouchers for a trip to Champneys (Tring branch, please) are, of course, always welcome (
champneys.com
), but in many cases, a half-hour soak in the tub is all we'd really like for Mother's Day - for the role, we all know, is its own reward.

It has become so fashionable to moan about how awful it is to be a mum that it feels almost taboo to admit that even the Weetabix stains on your new statement jacket can be a reminder, really, of how lucky you are.